Henry of Atlantic City Read online

  “Why should we believe a goddamn thing you’re telling us?” John the Troglite asked.

  Sy was quiet for a minute. “Maybe you shouldn’t,” he finally said. “I’m sure there’s a lot more going on here than I could ever know about.”

  “He’s right about that,” Henry’s father said. “Mind if I talk now?”

  John the Troglite nodded.

  “The numbers were cooked from the start—in case he did run. Either way, she figured she’d be covered.” He spread his arms. “A million here, a million there? What’s the difference, right? Either he does what he’s told and she’s got a little offshore account set up for herself. Or he runs, takes the heat, and the cooked books cover her for the difference. Not a bad little scheme, huh?”

  John the Troglite got mad and shouted at Henry’s father: “Listen to me, you son of a bitch, I’m not asking you what she expected. The books say there’s seven million dollars missing! Seven! I want to know why you only brought us three. Where’s the rest of the money?”

  Henry’s father didn’t look at John the Troglite; he looked at the emperor. “The books were cooked, sir. She had them cooked. It was part of the plan. I swear upon the soul of my mother and my mother’s mother what you have there is everything.” He looked at John the Troglite. “I am an honorable man and have acted out of loyalty to you.”

  John the Troglite was red in the face and about to start screaming again but the emperor held up his hand.

  Henry’s father looked around at all the men in the room. “It’s all there. You have my final word.”

  Germanus unclasped his hands. “It’s all a little too goddamn convenient,” he said. Then he crossed his arms over his chest and looked at the emperor and shook his head. “As far as I’m concerned we ought to get rid of the whole stinking bunch.” He waved his arm like he was sending something back to the kitchen.

  John the Troglite agreed.

  The emperor was quiet. Then after a few minutes he told Henry’s father to stand up. “What punishment would you recommend?”

  Henry’s father looked around at the generals and at Sy. He looked everyone in the eye, proud and tough. “It’s not for me to say.”

  “If you can make accusations, you can suggest punishments. Go ahead. You have my permission.”

  Henry’s father looked at the ground for a minute, then looked up and smiled. “Give me her job.”

  The emperor drummed his fingers on the desk and then raised his hand and slapped it down hard. “I’m too tired to listen to any more.” He beckoned to Sy.

  Sy’s face turned pale and he didn’t get up from his chair.

  The emperor beckoned to him again.

  Sy rose and walked up and stood at the emperors desk.

  “I hear that you got married recently.”

  Sy nodded but didn’t say anything.

  The emperor opened up the suitcase. “Marriage is a sacred institution, and it sickens me to see it falling into ruin. Do you plan to have children?”

  Sy nodded again and put one hand on the edge of the desk for support.

  “Children are a great treasure,” the emperor said and handed Sy three stacks of bills from the suitcase. “Thank you for the trust you’ve repaid me.”

  “I can’t accept it, sir,” Sy said.

  “Take it,” the emperor said. “Tomorrow is Christmas. Go and celebrate.”

  Then the emperor looked at Henry’s father. “I will consider your request,” he said. “You will have my decision after New Year’s day.” Henry’s father held out his hand but the emperor didn’t shake it. Instead he beckoned to Henry and took him on his knee. He stroked the back of Henry’s head and said, “Don’t worry, son. Don’t you worry about a thing. And don’t forget what you heard here today. One day you will understand and everything will make sense.” Then he put Henry down and told everybody to leave.

  Henry went back to the car with his father and Sy. One of the guards escorted them. Nobody said anything for a long time and Henry’s father kept looking in the mirror while he drove. “What did the old man ask you?” he asked after they had gone a long way.

  He asked if he should believe you, Henry said.

  “What did you tell him?”

  Henry said the truth, I told him to believe the truth.

  Henry’s father looked over his shoulder. “You are one amazing little bastard, you know that?” And he started laughing. Then Sy started to laugh too and Henry watched from the back seat while the two of them laughed so hard that Henry’s father almost drove into the other lane. Sy said, “You’re a fucking genius, Henry. And your old man has balls the size of the People’s Republic of China!” Then after they had stopped laughing and had driven for a while longer Sy said, “Think he’s going to give you the job?”

  Henry’s father didn’t answer right away.

  “Seems pretty likely, doesn’t it?”

  “I don’t want to think about it,” Henry’s father said and kept on driving.

  Back in the city they went to a bookstore where Sy said Henry would be able to get everything he wanted. The bookstore was filled from the floor to the ceiling with shelves and ladders to climb up on.

  “Get whatever you want, kid,” Sy said. “It’s on me.”

  When Henry began to climb the ladders, the man who owned the shop came out from behind the desk. He talked with a stutter. “Excuse muh-muh-muh-me, gentlemen,” he said. “This isn’t a children’s buh-buh-bookstore.”

  “My son isn’t a normal child,” Henry’s father said.

  “I’m sorry to hear that. This isn’t a nuh-nuh-nuh-normal bookstore either.” He motioned for Henry to come down. “Tell me what you want and I’ll guh-guh-guh-get it for you.”

  Henry pointed to the top shelf.

  “Henry’s an authority on the gnostics,” Sy said.

  Henry could tell the owner was mad by the way he climbed up the ladder. When he was at the top he didn’t turn around. “Okay. Which one do you wuh-wuh-want?”

  Henry pointed to The Coptic Gnostic Library in the middle of the shelf.

  “Are you sure?”

  Henry nodded.

  “It’s a cuh-cuh-complete scholarly edition. You have to take them all.”

  “Fine. Bring them down,” Sy said.

  “Are you sure? The cuh-cuh-cuh-cost is seven hundred dollars.”

  “I just said we’ll take them.”

  The owner reached out for the books one by one and started to climb down. “It’s a complete set. You under-sta-sta-sta-stand. I can’t break it up.”

  “No problem.”

  When the owner got down he looked at Henry and at Sy and Henry’s father. “He’s also interested in Procopius,” Sy said.

  “I only have the Loeb Library edition. It’s complete but used.”

  “Fine.”

  The owner went away and came back with more books. They were exactly like the ones Henry had in Philadelphia. “Will that be all?”

  “No,” Sy said.

  The owner looked half cranky, half sad. “What else can I do for you?”

  “We’ll take the whole shelf,” Sy said, pointing up to the top shelf.

  The owner looked at Henry and at Sy. “Is this suh-suh-some kind of practical joke? If it is, I’m nuh-nuh-not in the mood.”

  “We’re not in the mood for jokes either,” Henry’s father said. “You want to sell the books or not?”

  The bookstore owner didn’t say anything else after that. He took all the books from the shelf and packed them into boxes. He took the money Sy gave him and counted it and put it in the drawer. Then he held the door open while they carried the boxes out and put them in the trunk of a taxi.

  “This is where I vamoose,” Sy said.

  “Get in touch the usual way. But wait until after New Year’s,” Henry’s father said.

  Sy picked Henry up and hugged him and said, “I want to hear all about what’s in those books.” Then he got into a taxi. That was the last time Henry ever
saw him.

  On Christmas day Henry and his father walked in the park and then went to the ice-skating rink at Rockefeller Center. Henry’s father was a good skater. He taught Henry how to go fast and stop and even how to go backward. He said going backward was the best way to meet girls. They skated around the ring a few more times and Henry asked his father if his mother was dead.

  His father didn’t answer. He put his hands behind his back. “C’mon. Watch how I do this. Can you skate like this? With your hands behind your back?” After they skated for a while he said, “Listen, Henry. Don’t worry about your mother. Try not to think about it too much. Hey, how’d you like to go and see a hockey game?”

  Henry asked his father again if his mother was dead.

  “Yeah,” his father said. “She’s dead.”

  Henry asked how she died.

  His father pulled him to the side and they stood there for a few minutes watching people skate past them. “I figured I had a few more years before the questions came,” he said. “She died of an overdose.”

  Henry asked what an overdose was.

  “You’re too young for this, kid. I’ll explain it all some other day.”

  Henry asked what his mother looked like.

  His father pointed to a woman across the rink who was watching the ice skaters. “There! That’s what your mother looked like.”

  Henry looked at the woman. Her hair was tucked up under a beret and she was standing with her hands in the pockets of a long overcoat. Then his father grabbed his hand and pulled him back onto the ice before he could see her features. By the time they got to the other side of the rink she was gone.

  Henry asked his father what his mother was like and where she was buried.

  “All I can say is your mother was the most beautiful woman in the world. If she were with us now everything would be different.”

  Henry asked where she was buried but his father said, “Stop. I don’t like talking about it. Stop asking so many questions.”

  Henry said in the days when Eve was in Adam there was no death. When she separated from him death arose.

  “Look, Henry. Quit talking like that, okay? It gives me the creeps.” His father crossed his arms and they watched the other ice skaters for a little while. “I’m not the best father in the world. I know that, okay? But I’m doing the best I can. One day maybe you’ll understand.” Then he started skating again and Henry could see that he was frowning and his eyes were filled with tears and it wasn’t from the cold wind.

  That night the angel entered Henry’s ear again and told him not to be deceived. The angel said the truth is like ignorance because while it is hidden it rests within itself. Henry got out of bed and went to the window. He watched the city consuming itself in a shower of lighted windows and he wondered what had happened in the world that brought people into it and left them to be in it all alone. He wondered how people whose mothers weren’t dead were different, and why his father never wanted to talk about her.

  He tried to open the window but it wasn’t the opening kind, so he pressed his face against the glass so he could see all the way down to the street. He thought and thought as hard as he could and tried to remember the tiniest thing he could of the woman who had been his mother. But he couldn’t get further back than the apartment near the Gate of Eugenius and Ten Cents a Dance. Was she his mother? If she was, then why hadn’t she taken Henry with her when she left? If she was, then how did his father know she was dead? Why did his father get sad when Henry asked questions? No. Ten Cents a Dance could not have been his mother. Even if she was, she couldn’t have been. She had left him behind and had only ever made his father angry. And Henry knew his father was sad. His father had always been sad.

  Henry asked the angel who his mother was and the angel told him that all those who have fallen from the light and into the darkness of the body are born from a mother. Henry went back to bed and lay down and pulled the covers up over his head. He woke up a little while later. It was still dark. Henry didn’t cry. He could hear his father snoring. He lay in bed and called on his angel and the angel whispered back. It said that the next-best thing to virgin birth was not to know your mother.

  The next day Henry’s father dropped him back at the O’Briens’. He carried all the boxes of books up to Henry’s room, then talked to Mr. and Mrs. O’Brien for a little while. He gave Mrs. O’Brien a big envelope. She put it into a drawer next to the sink.

  “Okay, kid. I guess this is it,” his father said. He lifted Henry up in his arms and held him.

  Henry asked when he was going to come back again.

  “As soon as I can, kid. Just as soon as I can. You be good, now.” He put Henry down and messed up his hair. “You still have that chain?” he asked.

  Henry nodded.

  “Remember who gave it to you,” his father said and frowned the same way he had at the ice-skating rink. Henry followed him to the door. His father walked out to the street and got into the Jaguar without looking back. Henry stood in the door and watched his father drive away. He didn’t wave and Henry didn’t either.

  A little while later Mrs. O’Brien came up into Henry’s room. “Where’d you get these books?” She picked one up and held it in her hand, then put it down like it weighed too much.

  From Sy, Henry told her.

  “You know you’re not supposed to be reading these things,” she said.

  Henry said they were his Christmas presents.

  She stood in the door to Henry’s room and put her hands into the smock she always wore when she cleaned the house. “I’m calling Father Crowley,” she said. “If he says you can keep them, then it’s all right by me.” Henry lay on his bed and closed his eyes. A little while later he woke up and heard the priest and Mrs. O’Brien talking downstairs. Henry waited in his room. After a little while Father Crowley came in. “Merry Christmas, Henry.” His eyes went straight to the books all around Henry’s bed. “Did you have a nice time with your father?”

  Henry said yes.

  “Mind if I take a look at your new books?”

  Henry said they’re mine.

  “I don’t doubt it. Don’t worry. I’m only curious.” He sat on the bed and took each one and read the title out loud and put it down on the bed next to him. “Someone has spent a lot of money to provide all this reading material.” He held up a book and said, “Sheer nonsense.”

  Henry asked why.

  “Well, for one, there are no secret sayings of Jesus Christ. Jesus didn’t keep secrets, Henry. Everything he said comes to us in the Holy Gospels written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The things you have here are historical curiosities. Not the truth of Christ.”

  Henry said while the truth is hidden it rests within itself.

  “Would you mind explaining that?”

  Henry said the truth is in itself so it can be contained in many vessels.

  “But that does not mean every vessel contains the truth. Some vessels contain false truths. That kind of truth is evil.”

  Henry said there was no false truth because the truth contained itself and falsehood contained itself and falsehood could not be contained in truth.

  The priest got up. “I guess it’s going to take some more time before we understand each other. I want you to come to the rectory tomorrow to meet a friend of mine. Would you like that?”

  Henry didn’t want to go to the rectory to meet Father Crowley’s friend. He wanted to go back to Philadelphia to live with Sy’s sister.

  They went downstairs and Mrs. O’Brien gave them Christmas cake to eat. “The cake is delicious,” Father Crowley said.

  “She bakes a mean cake,” Mr. O’Brien said. He had crumbs in the corner of his mouth.

  “Christmas is my favorite time for baking. And this is my favorite recipe.” Mrs. O’Brien gave the priest another piece of cake. “You’d better eat it, Father. Else it’ll go stale.” Then she cut another piece for Mr. O’Brien, who always sat quietly and ate whatever was put in fr
ont of him. When he was finished he always said it was time to lie down.

  “I’d like to come for Henry in the morning,” Father Crowley said. “If you don’t mind.”

  “Come as early as you like, Father. I’ll have him ready when you get here.”

  The priest finished the cake and stood up and thanked Mrs. O’Brien and put on his coat and said good-bye. Henry went upstairs to his room and watched the priest get into his black Chevrolet Malibu and drive away.

  That night before going to sleep Henry called on his angel to come save him. It was very late and everybody was asleep. Henry got out of bed and tiptoed downstairs into the kitchen. He opened the drawer next to the sink and took out the envelope his father had given Mrs. O’Brien. It was filled with hundred-dollar bills. Henry took some and put the envelope back and went back upstairs to bed. He dreamed about Arnold Schwarzenegger. He was wearing necklaces and was wrapped in a white sheet that was stained with blood. He had something to tell Henry but he couldn’t get it out. Henry entered a huge church that was like the Hagia Sophia except that the outside was painted with designs and inside it was dark and smoky and a man was hanging from the ceiling upside down. His skin was all leathery and his hair was matted and he held his hands folded on his chest. Henry called up to the man and asked him if he was praying and the man said he was doing penance. Henry left the church and wandered through the woods and came upon big cities with churches in them and in each church somebody was doing penance.

  Father Crowley came and got Henry in the morning. When they were in the car the priest said, “I need to pay a quick visit to a friend who is in the hospital, Henry. Maybe you can help me cheer her up a little.”

  Henry watched out the window and counted the buses on the street. In Byzantium if you needed perfume you went to the Augusteaum. If you wanted bronze work you went to the Mese. If you wanted horses you went to Amastrianum Square. If you wanted to talk to God or any of his angels and saints you went to the Hagia Sophia. Henry felt in his pocket for his money and wondered where you went if you wanted a cab.